Essential Advice for Freshmen

As new students come pouring in and old students return for yet another year at Case Western Reserve University, it’s good to reflect on what we’ve learned in our time here and what we wish we had known from the beginning. It only seems fair that we share our knowledge with the new freshmen. So here are some tidbits that would have been helpful to all of us as freshmen, and hopefully will help this year’s newbies start the year off right.
• Learn your limits. And the best way to do that is to push past all of them.
Which might end horribly, but hey, at least now you know how far you can go.
• Reinvent yourself over and over again. No one here knows you, so it’s not like anyone will even know when it’s the first reinvention or the 20th. You deserve to be whichever version of yourself you want to be.
• Leutner and Thwing are pronounced Loot-ner and Thw-eeng. Don’t believe what your orientation leaders tell you. They’re just playing mean pranks.
• Explore Cleveland! Just get on the RTA and get off at a random spot. You don’t even have to know where you are. It’s a great way to learn about your new city and it’s perfectly safe. I hear the East is nice.
• Climb on the statues. Climb on every single one. Climb because they are like adult playgrounds.
• Remember that you might meet some crazy people now that you’re in college. Embrace them and maybe even become a little crazy yourself.
• Take all sorts of random classes. Whether it’s something as bland as Intro to Accounting or as enticing as Human Sexuality, you never know where your passions may lie.
• Dress for the weather. Unlike in high school when you either had indoor halls or were blessed with lovely weather year round, you now may have to walk to class in a blizzard. So wear a hat to prevent your freshly showered hair from freezing. And if you see someone walking around in shorts, that person is just hardcore. Don’t try to be that hardcore.
• SHOWER, DO LAUNDRY, AND CLEAN YOUR ROOM. If you don’t take any of the advice on this list, at least do these! I never cleaned my room though, and I doubt I’ll start even though I just said you should…
• Show everyone pictures of your home. Everyone really wants to see all the cool places they may or may not ever visit depending on how close you become.
• Sign up for every club’s mailing list that you’re even mildly interested in. All those emails will make you feel sooo popular.
• Live in the moment. Or study all night instead of going to the club with your friends. I’m sure you’re not missing out. It was probably boring.
• Take pictures with all the landmarks. Everyone gets their picture taken in front of PBL, so it won’t even be an obvious giveaway that you’re a freshman if you decide to do that.
• Play hide and go seek in PBL. But if you do it while on drugs, be prepared to get lost and eventually have a janitor find you whimpering in a not-90-degree-angle corner a few days later.
• Find a copy of “The Student Body.” It’s extremely rare and might be worth something to the right people.
Good luck everyone! Hope it’s a great year!